Samsung and Amazon have teamed up to give viewers a taste of season one of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power and drum up interest ahead of the TV series’ season two premiere on Prime Video.
Announced last week, the full first season of the big budget series from Amazon, set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of The Rings, has joined the device maker’s Samsung TV Plus free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) service lineup for a limited time.
Available on Samsung TV Plus since August 15, it marks the first time ever that the show has been available for free outside of a subscription service. The first season will stay on the Samsung FAST service for just about one more week until August 28, which is one day before the August 29 premiere of LOTR: The Rings of Power season 2 on Prime Video.
Samsung TV Plus is available and comes pre-installed on the electronics giant’s smart TVs as well as Galaxy mobile and other devices, bringing the limited-time sampling to consumers across 300 million devices outside of the Prime Video app. In the U.S. Samsung TV Plus viewers can catch season one of the series on a dedicated The Rings of Power free streaming linear channel, one of multiple aggregated channels (such as the Movie Hub, Movie Hub Action and All Action channels), and on-demand.
It’s an example of platform providers and content owners with their own DTC streaming services finding mutually beneficial ways to work together.
For Samsung it brings fresh and big-name premium content, on an exclusive albeit limited basis, to its FAST service. At this year’s NewFronts Samsung put an emphasis on expanding premium content and cited a focus on strategic partnerships for programming genres that it knows are important to agencies and their clients. While Amazon Fire TV devices compete with Samsung, its Prime Video subscription service isn’t in direct competition with the OEM’s FAST service.
For Amazon, meanwhile, it makes the franchise series available for free on millions of devices, potentially bringing in new fans, while also allowing existing fans to catch up and drum up interest for season two. And there’s the possibility for additional subscribers if season 1 piques interest for viewers that want to watch the next season and don’t yet have Prime Video.
Samsung TV Plus SVP & General Manager Salek Brodsky, in a statement, said the FAST was pleased to expand its partnership with Prime Video. Samsung and Prime Video previously partnered for the 2022 launch of the LOTR series.
“Nearly 300 million Samsung TV and Galaxy owners will have the opportunity to discover or catch-up on this hit series, while continuing to enjoy free access to one of the world’s largest offerings of live tv channels and popular titles on-demand,” said Brodsky.
Prime Video’s Sandhya Iyer, in the announcement, also commented on the collaboration for both parties.
“This sampling program marks a milestone for both organizations as we bring this iconic franchise to new audiences around the globe at no additional cost,” Iyer, GM of Global 3P Devices Marketing at Amazon Prime Video, in a statement. “We first collaborated with Samsung back in 2022 for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power series launch and have continued raising the bar together on delivering for soon-to-be and existing Tolkien fans.”
Content owners turning to device-maker FAST services like Samsung TV Plus to give viewers a sampling of TV shows or films and potentially drive them to their own apps is something other players in the streaming video space have also explored. Streamers can leverage viewing on FAST, and the device or FAST interface to offer content and then promote signups, encourage viewers to tune in for new shows or dive deeper into their content libraries.
Newly released research data from Horowitz speaks to the point of how viewing on FAST can impact paid subscription services. In an August report, the firm found that two in three (or 66%) of TV viewers are using FAST platforms in an average month. And among FAST users, 43% reported subscribing to a paid service to keep watching a show they started viewing on a FAST channel.
"These data underscore the important opportunity to leverage FAST strategically, with smart windowing and content promotional strategies," wrote Horowitz in the findings.
Reached by StreamTV Insider, Samsung declined to share information or confirm as to whether the Amazon partnership also involves on-screen prompts, deep links or other integrations around the LOTR programming to encourage and direct users to the Prime Video app or take other actions. But efforts along those lines have been seen with other players.
Vizio and NBCUniversal's Peacock, for example, teamed up last June when the SVOD signed on as the first content partner for the smart TV maker’s Content Connections discovery feature.
That program is tied to Vizio’s WatchFree+ FAST service and interface, enabling users to preview content and move directly from the FAST environment to subscription service apps.
With Peacock, Vizio promoted and gave viewers a limited-time preview of the SVOD’s programming for free on WatchFree+. The idea is to give viewers free access to select episodes of popular Peacock titles, and when viewed, the platform then serves what Vizio called “intuitive messages” that direct users to the content partner’s streaming app. And in Vizio’s case, there was a direct connection so viewers could jump from watching a Peacock show in the linear-style FAST channel right into the SVOD app to watch more episodes or sign up for an account.
Vizio featured the Peacock content, which was available for three weeks, in a dedicated preview channel that was also promoted on its home screen.
Article updated with additional data from Horowitz Research.